A Backwards Spiral
by Aberaz
Summary: The second day of term was already off to a bad start but, when Harry receives a package that sends him back to his parent's days at Hogwarts things are about to get worse. With the marauders avoiding him and Lily suspicious will Harry be able reconnect to the family he never knew and get home in time without revealing their horrible future? Or will he change their world forever?
1. Prologue

First story! Here we go, please feel free to give criticism on characterization or any errors I may have skimmed over. Any comments are much appreciated! I have a vague outline and hope to update whenever I can. Hope you like it!

I don't own hp

The Gryffindor common room was a home, a sanctuary, a place where students forgot their earlier squabbles of the day and became a family once again. A place where even the worst of enemies could be seen helping each other with potions homework or discussing the logistics of the current quidditch season. Its fireplace and welcoming atmosphere always made the weight on Harry's shoulders seem a bit lighter, if only for a moment. It reminded him of games of exploding snap laced with laughter and the soothing twinkling evenings spent relaxing with his two favorite people in the world after a long day of stress. Today, however, that was not the case. Harry stood awkwardly in the center of the common room on top a rug he didn't recognize, bear skin perhaps? The room's decor was.. different from the one in his memories. The layout of the room a mirror of when he last saw it but twisted slightly as if in a dream. Oddities littered the room: gold curtains instead of crimson, outdated spell books, different faces hidden behind books as if that would hide their eyes peering at him over the pages. It's not every day a student appears out of thin air. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other trying to regain a sliver of that distant comfort he remembered. He desperately attempted to reach out and grasp that warmth the room normally filled him with, but all he gained from the effort was piercing glances, suspicious whispers, and slight had spent a majority of his life the past few years in the public eye, he'd learned to create walls for the public and not let their actions affect him. He hadn't worried about other's opinions of him, but today he was in a well, unique situation, and there was always a first time for everything. It reminded him a bit of his second year, minus the buttons of course.

Harry stood in the common room face to face with James Potter, his father, who was currently a peeved of seventeen-year-old. James had been "persuaded" by McGonagall to give Harry a tour of the school, to see he didn't accidently get himself killed on his first day (to their knowledge). James had looked less than pleased at the suggestion glancing at Sirius while rising from his chair with a groan, rolling his eyes in Harry's direction before sauntering lazily past Harry and into the hall. After roaming the hallowed halls of the schools in a thick and stale silence, he reluctantly started listing some "interesting facts" about their most esteemed school. A majority of these "facts" were false and contained depraved retellings of the school's history. Harry restrained himself from interjecting, permitting James to continue his far-fetched tales speaking more to himself than Harry. His silence an offshoot of his paralyzing shock and the fact that he was supposed to be a brand new transfer student. There wandering eventually lead them to the common room, James now stood in the middle of the room with a confident yet apathetic stance and was reciting some, surprisingly accurate, basics of the house system putting emphasis on the glorious achievements of Gryffindors' past and the weaknesses of the other houses.

James groaned under his breath as he glanced at the scrawny kid in front of him. He would be willing to help the kid, give him a real tour if he needed one, but he was giving James nothing to work with. When James had jokingly started slipping in some more interesting twists to the dull history of the castle, the kid had simply nodded as if the great hippogryph war was a real, if even believable, event. He looked paranoid like someone was going to hex him at any moment and stood out like a sore thumb in the common room because of it. This kid was going to be a pain in the ass, he could feel it. James was anxious to get back to his friends, he and Sirius had been in the final stages of planning their first prank of the year when McGonagall had pulled him away, even detention was better than this. The kid wasn't even paying attention for Merlin's sake!

Harry looked up to see James staring at him, brows pinched, their eyes meeting for a brief moment, Harry felt his body go tense. He mentally berated himself for acting so skittish, looking back to the walls, eyes zipping around the room looking anywhere except James. 'Just because you can't tell them anything doesn't mean you have to treat them like they're boggarts get a hold of yourself,' he thought. The idea of slipping up and mentioning the future made his stomach churn. True, it was tempting to turn the marauders against Peter or find Alice and Frank to suggest some precautionary therapy sessions just to be on the safe side, but the thought having to look in each of their eyes and tell them exactly what the future had in store made him want to puke. 'Come on Potter look natural at this rate you'll isolate yourself and fail to blend in even more than you already have,' Harry cringed thinking of his earlier attempts to connect with his new classmates to find that half the slang he had been using hadn't been invented yet earning him questioning glances and whispers behind his back. He then had attempted to use time appropriate slang, and made himself outdated by calling a first year's potion groovy. 'How was I supposed to know that went out of style after the 60s?' He sighed, Harry would give nearly anything just to go to sleep already and wake up to find this entire situation was just a vision induced by some stray fumes from potions. 'I finally get presented with a chance I've always wanted and all I've done is made a fool out of myself and spill ink on Lupin's transfiguration homework. Of course, this still may turn out to be some crudely conceived prank, but oh no that'd be far too easy.' Well, it wasn't every day you get launched back in time against your will fate screwing you over in the process, but hey it for sure wasn't the first time.

"Oi, Granger are you even listening to me?" James snapped noting how the boy seemed to cringe at the sound of his name; he was getting impatient and was tempted to run off but if Granger got lost McGonagall would have him polishing trophies for a week. Plus he'd promised to help Moony rewrite his essay that the idiot in front of him had maliciously destroyed. He wished Remus had taken up of his suggestion of having the newbie do it for him. 'No James we have to make a good first impression,' the werewolf's voice echoed in his head.

"Huh- er yes of course I'm sorry, please continue," Harry was getting yelled at by his dad, ha first time for everything indeed. Harry smirked humorlessly at that, who would have thought that after all these years of wanting to hear his father's voice that he wouldn't even want to give him the honor. James looked him over with a hesitant expression before finally shaking his head and continuing his half-hearted speech a bit more bite in his voice this time. Harry sighed; it was going to be a very long week.

A/N there we go, the next chapter will be how he got back and continue chronologically from there. Thanks for reading!

Edit: edited and revamped it 12/26/15


	2. Quick Announcement: New Prologue

Hello! Long time no update, that may change soon.

When starting this story, I greatly overestimated the amount of motivation and free time I would have. I, unfortunately, haven't been nearly as on top of this as I wish I was. I have certain scenes typed, bits of dialogue, and an outline but very little time and motivation to actually jot it all down. However, this does not mean I'm abandoning the story. I'm mainly posting this to say "hi I'm not dead," and to tell you that **I rewrote the prologue** (there are roughly 400 more words than there was before). I did this in an attempt to kickstart my motivation for this story again, it worked but whether or not I have time to use that motivation is yet to be seen. Long story short: school is tedious and consuming my time, I'm going to try to continue this, go read what I updated if you want new content.

Stay strong, thank you all for the support, and I'll tell you if I eventually do drop it I promise.


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